“Success rate” in Horizon Europe usually means the share of eligible, evaluated proposals that end up funded — not the share of applicants who merely submit. It is one of the most-watched numbers in EU research funding because it directly shapes strategy: whether an applicant team invests months in a full proposal for a given call, how many resubmissions a coordinator budgets for, and how a research office advises investigators on where their odds are best. This guide summarizes what recent Horizon Europe success-rate data shows across the three pillars and the major instruments, why the figure moves so much from call to call, and where to check the current numbers yourself — because these figures are snapshots that shift as each round of calls closes, not fixed facts.
What “success rate” actually measures
The European Commission calculates Horizon Europe success rate as funded proposals divided by eligible proposals submitted for a given call, topic, or instrument (not divided by all submissions, since some are ruled ineligible before evaluation). A related but distinct figure is the pass rate — the share of eligible proposals that clear the minimum quality thresholds set by expert reviewers. Reporting on Horizon Europe’s evaluation data indicates that only around half of eligible proposals clear those thresholds in a typical round, and of the proposals that do clear them, only a minority are ultimately funded once available call budget runs out — the rest are “above threshold but unfunded,” a familiar and frustrating category for anyone who has coordinated a Horizon Europe bid. That two-stage funnel (threshold, then budget) is why success rate and proposal quality are related but not the same thing: a strong, fundable-quality proposal can still miss out purely on budget exhaustion in an oversubscribed call.
The overall trend: success rates have been falling
Horizon Europe’s overall success rate has declined as the programme has matured and demand has grown relative to available budget. Based on figures reported from the Commission’s own funding data:
- 2024 (full year): the overall success rate across Horizon Europe was reported at roughly 16.4%, with around 15,000 projects funded for a combined roughly €43 billion.
- As of January 2025: the cumulative success rate since the programme began was reported at roughly 15.3%.
- As of January 2026: the cumulative success rate was reported at roughly 14%.
That downward drift is consistent with how EU framework programmes typically behave over their lifecycle: early calls in a new programme often see lower application volumes relative to budget, and success rates compress in the middle and later years as more applicants (and more experienced, competitive applicants) chase a budget envelope that isn’t growing at the same pace. Treat the specific percentages above as a directional trend, not a number to plan a single proposal around — the pillar- and instrument-level variation below matters far more for any one application.
Success rates by pillar and instrument
Horizon Europe’s overall figure blends instruments with very different competitiveness profiles. Recent reporting on 2024 Commission data breaks out several of the largest:
| Pillar | Instrument | Reported success rate | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pillar I — Excellent Science | European Research Council (ERC) frontier-research grants | ~14.5% | Close to the programme-wide average; varies further by ERC grant type (Starting, Consolidator, Advanced, Synergy) and panel. |
| Pillar I — Excellent Science | Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) | ~16.3% | Covers doctoral and postdoctoral fellowship and training-network calls; varies by action type. |
| Pillar II — Global Challenges & European Industrial Competitiveness | Collaborative research (Clusters 1–6) | ~12% overall, with individual clusters reported around 12–16% | Multi-partner consortium calls; rate varies considerably by cluster and by specific topic within a call. |
| Pillar III — Innovative Europe | European Innovation Council (EIC) | ~8.8% overall | The most competitive pillar overall; some individual EIC Pathfinder calls in 2025 were reported as low as roughly 2%. |
The pattern that holds across almost every reporting period: EIC instruments (Pillar III) are consistently the most competitive, ERC and MSCA (Pillar I) sit close to the programme average, and Pillar II cluster calls vary the most call-to-call because budget and applicant volume differ sharply by topic and by year. A single-digit success rate on a specific EIC Pathfinder or Accelerator call is not unusual and should be factored into an institution’s go/no-go decision on whether to invest proposal-development resources in that specific call versus a better-odds alternative.
Why the number moves so much from call to call
A handful of structural factors explain most of the swing between a Cluster call at 12% and an EIC Pathfinder call at 2%:
- Budget per call versus applicant volume. A well-known, oversubscribed topic with a modest budget envelope will always show a lower rate than a less-visible topic with comparable budget and fewer competing applicants.
- One-stage versus two-stage evaluation. Some calls (common in EIC and some Cluster topics) use a two-stage process where a short outline is filtered before a full proposal is invited; the headline “success rate” for the call can refer to either stage depending on how it’s reported, so compare like with like.
- Threshold-pass rate versus funding-rate. As above, roughly half of eligible proposals typically clear quality thresholds, and only a share of those are then funded within budget — two separate filters that both affect the final number.
- Programme maturity. Success rates for a given instrument tend to compress over a programme’s life cycle as awareness and applicant sophistication grow faster than budget.
- Resubmission and reapplication effects. Applicant pools for recurring calls include a mix of first-time and repeat/resubmitting applicants, which shifts average proposal quality (and therefore the threshold-pass rate) year to year.
Where to check current, official figures
Because these numbers move with every closed call, treat any single article (including this one) as a snapshot rather than a live reference. For current data, go to the source: the EU Funding & Tenders Portal, which the European Commission uses to publish call-level statistics and evaluation results, and the Commission’s own Horizon Europe performance and programme statements pages, which report cumulative participation, funding, and success-rate figures periodically. For call-specific numbers, the evaluation results published on a topic’s own page in the Portal (once a call has closed and been evaluated) are the most precise source available — more precise than any pillar-level average, since they reflect the actual applicant pool and budget for that exact topic.
For the mechanics of registering on the Portal and preparing to apply, see CASRAI’s guide to EU Funding and Tenders Portal registration, PIC, and LEAR role. For how Horizon Europe’s three pillars, instruments, and eligibility rules fit together before you get to success-rate strategy, see Horizon Europe and EU Research Funding: An Overview. And for the broader mechanics of applying, see CASRAI’s general guide to how to apply for a research grant.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good success rate for a Horizon Europe proposal?
There is no single benchmark, because rates vary by instrument from roughly single digits (competitive EIC calls) to the high teens or, occasionally, considerably higher for niche or under-subscribed topics. The more useful comparison is against the specific call’s own historical rate (available in Portal evaluation results once a call has closed) rather than the Horizon Europe-wide average.
Does a higher success rate mean a call is easier to win?
Not necessarily. A higher rate can reflect lower applicant volume relative to budget rather than a lower quality bar — the threshold-pass rate (the share of proposals judged fundable in principle) is a better indicator of how demanding the evaluation itself is than the final success rate, which is also shaped by how much budget is available.
Are ERC and EIC success rates comparable?
Only loosely. They fund fundamentally different kinds of work — ERC funds frontier, investigator-driven research (Pillar I), EIC funds high-risk, market-creating innovation (Pillar III) — evaluated by different panels against different criteria, so a lower EIC rate does not mean EIC proposals are weaker on average; it reflects a different, generally more oversubscribed applicant pool relative to budget.
Do resubmitted proposals have better odds?
Horizon Europe does not publish a standardized resubmission-specific success rate at the programme level, and outcomes vary by instrument and by how substantially the proposal was revised. Reviewer feedback (an Evaluation Summary Report) is provided after an unsuccessful submission specifically so applicants can address the reasons a proposal fell short before resubmitting.
The figures in this guide reflect data reported for 2024 through early 2026, drawn from Commission programme statistics and specialist EU-funding reporting. Horizon Europe success rates are updated as each call round closes; always confirm current figures against the EU Funding & Tenders Portal or the Commission’s own performance reporting before using a specific number in a funding strategy decision.
